
 |
|
May 20, 2013
Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star
The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting
May 13, 2013
Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation
David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church
May 10, 2013
Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be
May 8, 2013
Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas
Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility
May 6, 2013
May 3, 2013
Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
|
| |
Jewish World Review
Oct. 9, 2007
/ 27 Tishrei 5768
Don Imus, consider yourself vindicated
By
Clarence Page
| 
|
|
|
|
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
As the steamy story of Isiah Thomas' sexual harassment suit unfolded, I could not help but wonder what his mother would think.
The first time I really paid attention to the retired NBA star and current New York Knicks coach was back in 1989 when his mother's life story was dramatized in an NBC-TV movie, "A Mother's Courage: The Mary Thomas Story."
Alfre Woodard depicted the feisty mom who raised her children alone on Chicago's rough West Side after separation from her husband. When the local Vice Lords street gang came to recruit her sons, she memorably greeted the gang-bangers with a shotgun and a threat to blow their sorry selves across the nearby expressway.
"First off, you have to keep an eye on your children," she said in a 1990 Ebony magazine article on how to save inner-city children from gangs. "Parents have to set examples. You can't hang around the taverns and expect your children to behave differently."
Sure enough. At his sexual harassment trial, young Isiah, now 46, launched into a full-tribute mama-thon on the witness stand, describing to the jury how Mama Thomas taught her boys to respect women.
In the end, his memories of mama appear to have helped the soft-spoken Thomas' case. When the three-week trial ended last week, a jury of four women and three men found in favor of the plaintiff, but let Thomas off the hook for paying damages.
The owners of the New York Knicks were ordered to pay $11.6 million to Anucha Browne Sanders, a former team executive who was fired from her $260,000-a-year job. The firing came after she endured a hostile work environment, she said, including crude insults and unwanted advances from Thomas, who denied the charges.
But what brought Thomas' mother to mind was an unnecessary but explosive revelation by Coach Thomas during his video deposition. In his version of etiquette, he revealed, it's wrong for a black man to call a black woman a bitch, but much worse for a white man to do it.
"A white man calling a black woman a bitch, … that is a problem for me," he said. But when asked in a follow-up if he would be bothered by a black man's using the same put-down, he said, "Not as much. I'm sorry to say. I do make a distinction."
Don Imus, consider yourself vindicated.
Imus, you may recall, lost his nationally syndicated radio show in the uproar over his referring to the Rutgers women's basketball team as "nappy-headed hos." The I-man claimed to have gotten his defamatory words from hip-hop. That still doesn't excuse his unsporting attack on a defenseless women's basketball team. But if my fellow black folks don't object to anyone, including sports stars and rappers, who spew such insults against women, we virtually admit to the same double-standard that Thomas says he is "sorry to say" he employs.
At least the Rev. Al Sharpton, to whom Imus appealed almost as an unofficial arbiter of black feelings, "unequivocally" condemned Thomas' comments. But don't hold your breath waiting for Sharpton, the Rev. Jesse Jackson or the recent multitudes of mostly black protestors against unequal justice in Jena, La., to turn out against Thomas or in support of Ms. Sanders.
Don't expect black sports fans to burn their Knicks tickets in protest or call for Thomas to be ousted like Imus was. Ms. Sanders is more likely to be vilified as some sort of Jezebel, sent perhaps by white conspirators to "bring another brother down."
Imus was vulgar, but black popular culture wrote his script. In the early 1970s, films like "Super Fly" and "The Mack" glamorized and glorified the sleazy worlds of drug dealers and pimps. Despite their technical excellence, they signaled the beginning of a long slide from a period of rebellious politics into a sexist rebellion against self-respect that today infects the popular culture of a new generation.
Isiah Thomas' blase attitude toward the B-word tells us this attitude has infected top sports management. I don't know what his mother would say. But I know mine would not be happy.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Comment on Clarence Page's column by clicking here.
Archives
© 2007, TMS
|
|

Arnold Ahlert
Mitch Albom
Jay Ambrose
Michael Barone
Barrywood
Lori Borgman
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Richard Z. Chesnoff
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
Christine Flowers
Frank J. Gaffney
Bernie Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Argus Hamilton
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
Ron Hart
Nat Hentoff
A. Barton Hinkle
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
Ch. Krauthammer
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Ann McFeatters
Dale McFeatters
Dana Milbank
Jeanne Moos
Dick Morris
Jim Mullen
Deroy Murdock
Judge A. Napolitano
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Star Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Sharon Randall
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Heather Robinson
Debra J. Saunders
Martin Schram
Greg Schwem
Culture Shlock
David Shribman
Roger Simon
Lenore Skenazy
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Ben Stein
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Dan Thomasson
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Byron York
ZeitGeist
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Baloo
Lisa Benson
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
John Branch
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
Matt Davies
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Glenn Foden
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Walt Handelsman
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holbert
David Horsey
Lee Judge
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Jimmy Margulies
Jack Ohman
Michael Ramirez
Rob Rogers
Drew Sheneman
Kevin Siers
Jeff Stahler
Scott Stantis
Danna Summers
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters
Dan Wasserman

Tech Q&A
Mr. Know-It-All
Ask Doctor K
Richard Lederer
Frugal Living
On Nutrition
Bookmark These
Bruce Williams
|